Over recent years, the Charter4Change coalition has played a leading role in securing new guidance through the Grand Bargain for policy-makers and humanitarian agencies to promote accountability for equitable partnerships in humanitarian action. This blog summarises learning from both INGO signatories and national NGO endorsers of Charter4Change in taking this forward, as shared in a webinar in Summer 2024.

A C4C webinar was organized featuring representatives from two INGOs (CAFOD and HelpAge) and two national NGOs (Women for Change South Sudan and a Syrian-based NGO not named for risk management reasons) sharing their experiences and perspectives. This was followed by a discussion with over 70 INGO and national NGO members of the C4C coalition.  

Background: Grand Bargain Caucus on the Role of Intermediaries and the updated C4C Charter Commitment on Principled Partnership

Charter4Change (C4C) has been at the forefront of advocating for the Grand Bargain Caucus on the Role of Intermediaries, which provides key recommendations to donors, UN agencies, and NGOs on promoting accountability for equitable partnerships. Since the release of the Caucus Outcomes, some Grand Bargain signatories have implemented its recommendations, though progress has been uneven. Encouragingly, this year’s reporting process for all Grand Bargain signatories incorporated questions for donors, UN agencies, and INGOs, probing how they are delivering against these, signaling a step toward greater accountability and transparency.

To further drive momentum in these efforts, the Charter4Change coalition undertook a review and update of the C4C Charter over the past year. A key focus of this process was revising the second commitment on Principled Partnership to reflect recent innovations. The updated wording is:

“Affirm and endorse the outcomes of the Grand Bargain Caucus on the Role of Intermediaries and the IASC risk sharing framework: We recognise that agencies must endorse and go beyond the UN/NGO Principles of Partnership (Equality, Transparency, Results-Oriented Approach, Responsibility and Complementarity) by establishing clear systems and processes to action these in our agencies and with our local partners. We will also advocate to donors and innovate our partnerships to strengthen mutual accountability and systematic approaches to partnership health/quality, including risk sharing, with national and local partners.”

Sharing experience from four Charter4Change members

CAFOD:

For CAFOD, instead of using the term “localization”, the agency has adopted the concepts of supporting quality partnerships and promoting local leadership, agency, and voice. Its recent steps towards accountability for equitable partnerships emphasize demonstrating concrete actions in these areas. As a partnership-based INGO with a long history of solidarity, subsidiarity, and partnership, CAFOD has benefitted from substantial supporter funds, enabling it to adopt more flexible, partner-led approaches that some other INGOs may find challenging due to differing values or funding structures.For many years, CAFOD’s country teams have used diverse methods to assess the health of their partnerships with local partners, often tailoring their approaches based on local partners’ preferences and guidance. CAFOD has also drawn on practices used by other INGOs, such as Keystone surveys and participation in the Core Humanitarian Standard (CHS) process, which includes an independent audit of its performance on localisation and partnership metrics. CAFOD has taken a prominent role in advocating for the Grand Bargain Caucus on the Role of Intermediaries, working to rally other Grand Bargain signatories to support its outcomes and recommendations.

Recently, as part of a global programme review, CAFOD has taken significant steps to implement a more systematic approach to accountability for quality partnerships, building on past experiences. CAFOD has now integrated MEAL (Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability, and Learning) processes across all its country and regional programmes, which assess partnership quality and support for local leadership, agency, and voice. To ensure greater consistency and clarity, CAFOD has developed guidance for creating bespoke partnership agreements, aligning strategic objectives and values while providing a consistent framework to evaluate the health of partnerships. At the corporate level, CAFOD has established Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) related to localisation. These include tracking how it supports local partners, especially in terms of their direct access to funding. The board of trustees, which includes representatives from local civil society, regularly reviews these KPIs, ensuring that localisation remains a central focus. CAFOD has also emphasized the need for better coordination among donors to harmonize approaches to accountability for quality partnerships. It advocates for reducing administrative burdens that hinder the establishment of equitable relationships and calls for long-term investments in capacity-building and emergency preparedness with local partners. These measures are crucial to fostering quality partnerships.

HelpAge:

HelpAge is undergoing a transformative journey to redefine its approach to partnerships. By embracing a model where partners lead programming decisions, HelpAge has shifted from viewing partners as low-capacity actors to recognizing their strengths. HelpAge is developing a partnership feedback survey, which can serve as an essential tool for accountability and understanding partner perspectives.

In addition, the organisation’s new results framework and partnership typology are also crucial steps in this journey, enabling HelpAge to track progress and better support their partners in funding applications.

Women for Change South Sudan

From the perspective of Women for Change, transparency and inclusivity in decision-making are essential for effective partnerships.  While some INGOs are excelling in this regard, many still fail to involve local actors enough. Historically, the experience of most national NGOs is to be treated as the junior, dependent partner with the power dynamics being highly top-down. Shifting this towards INGO-national NGO partnerships that centre the leadership of local organizations, recognizing their strengths and rootedness in communities, is key.

Risk-sharing and capacity-building initiatives are vital, and organizations like Trocaire and CAFOD were applauded for providing well-designed processes of accompaniment and support to local actors in the design and implementation of programmes, and in the pursuit of funding opportunities.

Syrian national NGO

The representative from a Syrian national NGO shared a successful consortium experience in Syria which illustrated the power of collaborative decision-making between INGO, national NGO and grassroots women-led CSO partners. The consortium’s structure and ways of working —comprising diverse actors with complementary strengths—led to meaningful outcomes; ranging from support to grassroots women-led organizations in hard-to-access parts of Syria through to advocacy at regional and global levels.  

A key challenge highlighted in relation to this experience has been how not all donors are support of equitable and empowering partnership approaches. Some donors tend to adopt highly top-down and directive approaches, which then undermine efforts to foster more equitable and empowering approaches by both INGO and national NGO partners working together. If donor agencies were to establish clearer policies and guidance on promoting equitable and empowering partnerships, and to provide for channels for the national/local partners to raise concerns when these practices are not followed, this would help.

Shifting from policy into practice and accountability for equitable partnerships

Insights shared through the presentations in this C4C webinar, as well as the lively dialogue amongst a wide range of C4C members that participated, demonstrate an inspiring momentum amongst INGO and national NGO members of Charter4Change.

By embedding accountability for quality partnership into their core practices, agencies can start to address the long-held criticisms of the INGO sector – that it is top-down and rooted in out-dated attitudes, cultures and practices that treat local organisations, and people in countries affected by crisis, as junior partners or passive beneficiaries of the INGO. For years, much of the localisation policy discussion centered on tracking funding flows to local actors, which are indeed an important metric of shifting power. But there are qualitative aspects to promoting locally-led humanitarian action which are equally important. Establishing and tracking accountability for equitable partnerships have to be at the heart of addressing this.